


boys in the house

by bossymarmalade (maggie)



Category: Batman (Comics)
Genre: Exploitation, M/M, Mind Games, Power Imbalance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2006-05-22
Updated: 2006-05-22
Packaged: 2017-10-06 17:11:53
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 566
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/55961
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/maggie/pseuds/bossymarmalade
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>when you're a bat, it's what you don't say.</p>
            </blockquote>





	boys in the house

**Author's Note:**

> ficbyzee said this:
> 
> Sometimes listening to Pandora is dangerous. Especially if it plays a song called Houseboy by Juliana Hatfield while you're thinking about Robins.
> 
> _You can sleep in my bed tonight  
> But you better not have dirty feet  
> And I don't like talking after I fool around  
> I just like to sleep_
> 
> standard foreword: if i have written something problematic/oppressive to a marginalized group that you find hurtful, please please please don't think twice about telling me. i will never spew hate at you, will never attack you, and i will always thank you and make the change.

Dick gets a look sometimes. Not 'A Look', not in capitals in Tim's head, because intimated capitals are reserved for Him and Him alone.

No, Dick just gets a look, but it's enough because Dick is so expressive, even behind the domino mask when he's suited up. Tim's the opposite there. Wearing that little scrap of green over his eyes maybe lets him be *more* animated than he usually is, when his face is all naked and exposed and anybody can look at him. It's weird how freeing the costume can be, for all its limitations.

Today the look is happening over brunch, and Tim pokes steadfastly at his hash browns to avoid Dick's eyes. "Have some bacon," Dick says, and his fork intrudes on Tim's plate to deposit half a strip of thick applewood bacon. Tim feels kind of sick but mumbles his thanks anyway, and Dick steals a bite of cubed-up potato.

"They used to have the shredded kind here, remember?" he says, swallowing. "Bruce hated them. He always used to get the kitchen to make him country-fried potatoes, with the red skins." He grins, that wry sideways smile. The one he generally uses when he's talking about Bruce, especially in public where pretty much everything they say is carefully edited by tone to indicate if they're referring to show-Bruce or real-Bruce. The careless timbre Dick's using is somewhere in-between. "Not that the waitresses and waiters ever minded much," he adds with a slight eye-roll.

Tim glances around at the cheesy booths, the cracking plastic laminate on the menus, the students and families eating around them. "Bruce ate _here_?" he repeats, lifting an eyebrow. Dick stretches the truth sometimes. He says it's acceptable in the name of a good story, but Tim can usually tell.

Dick nods, looking satisfied. "I dragged him, of course," he admits. "Does him good to get his feet dirty every now and again."

The coffee Tim's drinking spatters down the wrong way and pain spackles through his chest as he presses his mouth tightly closed, determined not to start hacking and coughing in the middle of the restaurant. He blinks rapidly and memory swims up from his bleary subconscious unbidden, His voice in the dead dark and the rich, rich smell of His sheets.

When Tim's vision clears, Dick is looking at him with no trace of a smile. It's a look, it's *the* look, and Tim can hear Bruce's voice, unguarded for just a moment and long enough to slip up -- _don't get dirt in my bed, dick used to jump in with dirty feet_ \-- not much, but enough for Tim to figure stuff out before He closed up again, silent like a lake.

Tim's a good detective. He gathers information and deduces and extrapolates without even thinking about it most of the time. He knows Bruce well enough to know that there's hardly a thing that Bruce says without meaning to, and he knows people well enough to be able to discern when they've told the truth by accident.

He knows himself well enough to let self-preservation kick in, and he hadn't said anything back, just made a little non-committal noise with Bruce's heavy hand against his hip and that rich, rich smell.

Dick is looking at him and Tim, dazed, looks back and can see that for the first time, Dick's face expresses nothing at all.


End file.
